Abstract
Post-secondary coursework related to agriculture and the food supply has been at the core of the United States' land-grant system for more than 150 years. However, as the complexity of food systems has grown, so too have critiques that the education provided in these programs is too narrow to adequately prepare graduates to address pressing food systems issues. In response, some higher education institutions have developed degrees in food systems. To support development of this burgeoning field, we created, tested, and refined four evidence-informed, interdisciplinary, equity-oriented, open-access teaching modules. These modules are based on our experience conducting a multi-site, multi-year transdisciplinary investigation of subsidized, or “cost-offset”, community supported agriculture and a survey asking instructors at land-grant institutions (n = 66) about topic offerings and current unmet needs for instructional materials. Our collaboration illuminated the potential and challenges of food systems research; underscored the value of transdisciplinary research teams; and identified several equity-oriented topics related to the design, implementation, and evaluation of local food initiatives suitable for advancing sustainable foods systems education. Instructors reported that the most helpful teaching aids would be case studies, lesson plans with active learning components, and reference lists with relevant peer-reviewed publications. The final modules seek to shed light on the complexity of food systems projects and build knowledge, vocabularies, and skills across disciplines engaged with food systems. Per instructor-defined needs, each module features a case study, active-learning activities, and references. We anticipate that the adaptable modules will be suitable for a wide range of students and courses.
Highlights
In the U.S, there has been a long tradition of agricultural education that dates back to the Morrill Act of 1862 and the establishment of the land-grant system
The second is to describe how the Farm Fresh Foods for Healthy Kids (F3HK) study, a transdisciplinary research collaboration that investigated the effects of subsidized community-supported agriculture programs on diets, farm businesses, and local economies (Seguin et al, 2017), informed the development of sustainable food systems education (SFSE) teaching materials
Mapping the density of food systems programs at land-grant institutions (LGIs), we identified geographic differences (Supplementary Figure 1), with few programs available at LGIs in the southern U.S and none offered at LGIs in the south-central U.S
Summary
In the U.S, there has been a long tradition of agricultural education that dates back to the Morrill Act of 1862 and the establishment of the land-grant system. The second is to describe how the Farm Fresh Foods for Healthy Kids (F3HK) study, a transdisciplinary research collaboration that investigated the effects of subsidized community-supported agriculture programs on diets, farm businesses, and local economies (Seguin et al, 2017), informed the development of SFSE teaching materials. Our team had extensive experience with community-engaged research at the onset of this five-year study, the collaboration deepened our understanding of the opportunities and challenges of transdisciplinary partnerships to address food systems issues These included developing shared vocabularies, acknowledging disciplinary assumptions about what constitutes high-quality research and/or analytic approaches, building trust with communities and partners unfamiliar with CSA models and/or academic research, exploring diverse indicators to measure impact, learning new methods, and working through differences of opinion regarding topics such as study approaches, methods, and measures.
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